


Everythings Changing

by Agent_Maine



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: M/M, Multi, Post season13 - AU, Will add other tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-24
Updated: 2017-03-13
Packaged: 2018-09-19 18:03:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 5,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9453437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Agent_Maine/pseuds/Agent_Maine
Summary: What would happen if hargrove HAD an AI to run the Meta suit? And what would happen if it was already installed before epsilon got to it and thus, didn't need to sacrifice himself.How would everything change?





	1. Winds of Change

“Its got everything we need… Tucker. Take off your-“

“I’m sorry sir, but I can’t allow you to do that.” The all to familiar voice of FILISS interrupts church and makes him look at the screen.

“Why?!” Church argues in obvious anger and annoyance.

“Because **_He_** will not be happy to share the suits systems.” FILISS responded easily.

“What do you mean ‘He’?!” Church growled.

“Church, forget about it, just transfer over to caboose or something.” Tucker retorted.

“No.” Church responded.

“Fine, whatever, just don’t do anything stupid to piss off whatever runs this suit.” Tucker retorted, making church sputter a little in attempts to defend himself before settling with a grumbled ‘fuck you’ to tucker. It not like he’d be around long anyways.

“So? How’s it fit?” Church asked.

“Its alittle tight in the cod piece but it’ll do.” Tucker joked as church rolled his eyes.

The moment the doors were blasted open, everything slowed.

“Are you... sure about this?” E-Delta asks as he looks at epsilon.

“I'm sure... start a recording for me, D.” He responded with a gentle head nod.

“Recording.” Delta sounds uncertain, but epsilon won’t remember here in a moment.

“Hey guys... if you're hearing this then it means you did it. You won. You kicked the shit out of Hargrove's forces. I knew you could. But this is my last stop. See, when I came into this world, I was really just a collection of somebody else's memories.” As he speaks, He looks over at each one of the Reds and Blues. “But with your help, these memories... they-they took form! They became my voice, my personality. And, after a while, I... I began to make brand new memories of my own. All of these things are what make me who I am... but they're also holding me back.” He gives a heavy sigh and looks at the Meta's armor. “I can't run this suit as Epsilon, but if I –“ He stops when his data pad suddenly turns black and vanishes, suddenly denying himself access to his own systems. “What?! Hey asshole! I wasn’t… No…. B-But how?”

**_“Epsilon does not run this suit. Therefore epsilon shall not have access…. I think you should sleep instead.”_ **

The voice that responds to him is deep and alittle gravely.

“Fuck off! I’m trying to save my friends! Stop hijacking my systems!” He shouted in obvious anger.

**_“Sleep epsilon. Sleep, all shall be fine when you awake.”_ **

For some god aweful reason, the voice wa very reassuring, and well, it was taking over his systems, not like he had a choice, so when epsilon went offline, the white holo-avatar projected in his place, looks somewhat similar to the armor tucker wore. **_“M374 now at full operations. Fighting simulation 2.013 running. Six allied bodies present, multiple hostiles located.”_**

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tucker wasn’t sure what the hell happened, but they got out of charon’s ship alive. Most of the work wasn’t done by him though. And he wasn’t sure if it was church controlling the armor, or if it was what ever else was in the armor. Church wasn’t responding to him either, so hopefully everything was okay and they were playing nice.

When they got back down to the planet and to Carolina and wash, tucker was prepared for the worse. And getting tackled to the floor by Carolina and hit repeatedly was definitely not what he was hoping for, Bow chicka bow wow.

He did make a confused noise when the suit suddenly activated on its own because suddenly Carolina was thrown off by the over light shield being activated. **_“Hostile detected.”_** That voice sounded oddly hesitant.

“Hey! Hey! Hey! Wait! She’s not hostile! She’s just pissed a hell!” Tucker yipped as Carolina growled out his name. “It wasn’t me! This suit has some weird on board system or something! Church help!” Tucker yipped as he crawled backwards to avoid Carolina.

Thankfully church did appear, flickering a bit as he shook his head. “Woah. Woah… What the hell did I miss?” He mumbled as he looked around. “Did we win?” He asked.

“Yeah we won! Why the hell are you asking that when you were there?!” Tucker responded, thankfully able to stand now that Carolina wasn’t advancing on him.

“I wasn’t! I got my systems hijacked and I got forcefully logged off!” Church answered as he threw his hands out.

“What do you mean epsilon?” Carolina growled.

“This suit has another AI…. And you might not like this. But.” Church looked to his left as the AI projected, transparency dimmed greatly to barely be visible, seeming hesitant once more.

_“Maine?!_ ”

 


	2. Memory isn't always a key

Tucker had been in and out of medical for a week after the discovery of their newest team member. Wash was greatly concerned over tucker’s health and Carolina was pissed and demanded that he’d instantly be handed over. Tucker handed over epsilon instead, pretending it was the other AI whom called himself **_M374_** which technically spelled Meta.

Tucker just felt better with calling the AI Maine instead. Getting settled with him however, was different. Maine was very temperamental at times, and with the ability to control the armor tucker wore, it was difficult to keep him under control at times. But, tucker managed, even with a constant migraine and all. This is where Washington’s concern stemmed from, because Maine before he went off the deep end and became meta, always had headaches as well.

Grey reassured them that it was nothing like that. It was just because both tucker and Maine were stressing out (probably from Carolina’s constant death threats perhaps?), and while it didn’t ease wash completely, it did get him to relax a little. Now, alone time in their quarters was DEFINITELY awkward, because Maine rarely logged off.

It should also be added, that Hargrove also took away most of Maine’s memories so he didn’t react as he usually did from what Washington had told them. And this was another reason why he didn’t want Carolina or Wash to take him. Because then something might happen that may make Maine go off and yeah, they didn’t need that.

**_“Why do you two do what you do? It seems rather taxing, especially with the amount of nerve and hormone activity.”_ **

Oh god he was asking about why he and wash have sex again. “Well um… We do it to show how much we love each other dude. All that activity you’re detecting, makes us very vulnerable, so it shows how much I love and trust Wash.” He tried to explain, somewhat feeling like he was talking to junior or something with how he had to explain this.

**_“Is the reaction the same in David?”_ **

“Yeah least I ho- Wait what? Where did you hear that name?” Tucker stopped mid-sentence when he heard this and looked at the small AI on his shoulder.

 ** _“You?”_** He was questioning himself.

“I’ve been calling him Wash this entire time. Everyone’s called him wash, no one’s called him David.” Tucker responded, seeing the faint flicker to his projection before he headed down the hallway now to the training room. “Wash!” He called.

The grey and yellow armored male turned to look at him. “Tucker? I thought you were resting?!” He retorted as he let the lieutenant’s take a break while he headed over to tucker.

“I was, but Maine decided to ask some questions and all. And I think you should know something.” Tucker responded as calmly as possible.

“What’s going on?” Washington asked warily.

“He called you David. I think he’s starting to remember on his own.”


	3. Key's don't always fit in the right places.

_“Shit! Cover! Cover!”_

_“I’m cornered! I can’t!”_

_“AGH!!”_

_“North!”_

_He watched as north backed into a corner to avoid his fire, a low rumble rippling from his chest before a horrid, angered, chortle like sound escaped him when he heard north scream. NO! His friend wasn’t supposed to die! He ripped a concussive grenade from hi belt and threw it, hearing south’s cry then the dull thud and hurriedly moved forward and checked over north._

_He was already dead. Several rounds from south’s battle rifle where imbedded in north’s chest and what looks to be the starting of a charged detonation. He bared his teeth, hand going for his knife, but his armor locked, sigma refusing to let him have the privilege of slaughtering her._

**_“It’s alright meta. It’s alright. We can use her. Get another AI out of her then you can have you’re fun ripping her apart.”_ ** _Sigma cooed in his head, allowing him to relax and regain motion in his arm as he put both knee’s down on the ground and carefully propped north up, letting his head drop so he could disengage the helmet and get to the THETA implant._

_“I’m sorry theta. I’m so sorry she did this to you. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”_

“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Washington awoke to the sounds of distressed mumbling and sat up a little. Usually he was the one being awoken from a nightmare, but tucker was mumbling in his sleep, flailing and kicking and disturbing Washington. He reached a hand over first to turn on the bedside lamp then sit up fully and try to shake tucker awake. “Tucker…. Tucker…. Tucker!” Washington shouted at list, only to grunt when he gained a hefty kick to the jaw from tucker’s flailing before the other finally awoke and sat up, breathing heavy and hand instantly shooting to the back of his neck to feel the edges of the implant.

“Oh shit oh shit, oh shit, Meta! Meta! Fuck Maine! Project!” He demanded, eyes wide and tears suddenly brimming at the edges and causing Washington to make a noise before putting a comforting arm around tucker, who leaned into the comfort instantly while the AI finally projected by Washington’s more neat pile of armor on top of the foot locker at the well, foot of the bed.

“ ** _I’m so-“_** “Don’t!” Tucker interrupted instantly.

 

“Tucker, what the hell happened?” wash asked, uncertain as he looked between tucker and the AI.

“He….. I…. He was remembering again…. And I guess he couldn’t contain it this time.” Tucker mumbled, swallowing thickly.

“What did he remember?” Wash asked worriedly, worried about what kind of horror tucker must have been relieving in the AI’s memories.

 ** _“He wasn’t supposed to die…”_** There’s this static, or crack, in Maine’s voice that has wash even more concerned.

“He remembered how he got theta.” Tucker finally explained.

Washington suddenly felt, very, _very, **very**_ sick.


	4. Blood in the water.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry its taken me this long to get a chapter up, but hopefully i'll be able to get more some more chapters up regularly!

Tucker was spending the last few days in medical more so than usual. It had everyone on edge, especially wash since wash knew the reason but refused to tell anyone. Because if he told one of the reds or one of the blues, then they’d talk amongst themselves, out loud, like super loud, then Carolina would hear it, and first she’d yell at Washington on why she wasn’t told, then she’d tell Kimball, then Kimball would yell at everyone before they’d demand Maine’s removal, then he didn’t know what would happen.

 

Maine had sever battle training due to his upbringings, being a gift from the Spartan program, Maine was deadly when he needed and or wanted, and with being implanted into tucker, he could easily make tucker just as deadly if not more so because tucker was smaller and much more flexible then Maine actually was. It also didn’t help Maine was getting worse. He wasn’t able to contain his memories as easily as when it first started, this caused a lot of fighting in tucker’s sleep, and it was getting worse.

 

Maine’s memories and therefore tucker’s nightmares were getting darker and darker and it was getting to the point where tucker was starting to be like Washington. Refusing to sleep half the time. It was reminding Washington of why he acted like this and straining his and epsilon’s barely working friendship. It worried Washington more because tucker didn’t want to see him half the time.

 

Washington however, decided to not listen this time by bringing tucker food instead of one of the lieutenant’s. When he got there, grey informed him tucker was in a medicated sleep and with epsilon’s help, was trying to check over Maine’s coding, but apparently Maine’s coding since he was a full AI, was much more complex then Epsilon could remember.

 

With grey’s permission, Washington sat at tucker’s bedside for now. So that’s where he sat, setting the tray on a table nearby before leaning back in his seat. “You guy everyone worried tucker.” He mumbled. “Carolina’s especially mad at you tucker, grey and Kimball are the only two barely keeping her out of here.” He mused with the weakest of chuckles.

 

Washington continued to talk randomly on things that had been happening during tucker’s time in medical, feeling the need to catch him up on the events. His talking trailed off when epsilon projected on the tray.

“Ooh. Wash… Didn’t know you were in here.” Epsilon mumbled.

“Its fine epsilon. What did you need?” He asked.

“I just wanted to talk to Maine. See how he’s holding up. We’re trying this new code routine to try and help stabilize him.” Epsilon responded.

Washington nodded a bit as Maine finally projected, faintly stretching out as if he’d just been asleep, and he probably was. He vaguely listened as epsilon had a one sided conversation with Maine, mainly because Maine’s projection was flickering in and out a lot because Maine was connected to tucker, and with tucker unconscious a lot of Maine’s power was gone.

 

Maine admitted to not noticing any different in himself with the new code at the moment other than feeling extremely tired, annoying epsilon a little before he waved off Maine and allowed the AI to log off and continue sleeping. Epsilon then went back to helping grey while Washington sat there and slowly fell asleep.

When Washington awoke, the tray was empty of food, and tucker wasn’t in the bed. When he asked grey where tucker was, she seemed just as worried. She never discharged tucker.


	5. Shark in the waves

**_Shit, shit, shit._** _He was in so much trouble, but his head was fucking_ **_pounding_**. _He groaned and slowly sat out, vision blurry as he slowly looked around. The area looked to be covered in some kind of tarnished metal, looked like one of those cave bases the feds or rebels use to have during their civil war. God why was he here? Last he remembered he was in medical sleeping._

_“Maine?” He called instantly regretting it, his throat felt raw, god did he start screaming in his sleep or something? He looked around as his eyes adjusted to the dull lighting and weren’t as blurry. Thus allowing him to more steadily pull himself up without tumbling over. God this was like the time in Takunda on his way to basic training with those twins in the bar. (Bow chicka bow wow)_

_Now that he was standing up fully, he looked around, finally taking notice that he was still out of armor (shit) and that he had bandaging wrapped tightly around his neck. What? He brought his hands up instantly and felt the bandaging, the back felt dry but the front felt damp in a way. Shit! What happened?! “MAINE?!” He called, his voice utterly hoarse as he looked around rapidly._

_That’s when he heard the scraping of metal on metal and turned. His gaze fixed on the steel grey and bright yellow armor in the archway. Wash? Tucker thought as he looked at him, watching the other carefully step in. “Hey buddy? How ya feeling?” He asked, wash sounded a lot less stern than usual, even worried. “I’m fine wash. What the hell’s going on? Where are we?” He asked, but god it still hurt to talk._

_“Maine, you shouldn’t try to talk. God you’ve got blood running down the side of your mouth, sit down.” Wash responded in utter worry as he grabbed a few rags_.

_NOW tucker knew what was happening, this must have been one of Maine’s memories. That means he needed to bring the AI to awareness, so they’d both wake up, only real way to do that was to do something that didn’t compute with the real memory. But shit, what was he supposed to do?!_

_Tucker’s only idea that usually worked was self-injury, because any other way (other than that one time of him kissing **south** ) usually didn’t work and fucked over the memory somehow then church got pissed because he’d have to fix it. Okay, okay, okay. So he needed a weapon then. He looked around carefully before spotting a syringe with something in it. Overdose? Yeah, that could work. He moved for it quickly, getting a startled noise from wash when he knocked him over and damn near knocking over the small table too when he grabbed the syringe._

_Mere seconds away from plunging the needle into himself, his entire body locks. What the fuck? What the **actual fuck?!** His body won’t listen no matter how hard he tries, even as his arm very slowly, pulls away and drops the syringe. _

_“N-Now Maine. You can’t be mad. Carolina and the Director thought it was best. O-Okay?” Wash sounds scared now as tucker looks at him, making a confused noise._

_“They had to.” Wash’s voice is much softer now as he laid a hand on him._

_Had to what?! Tucker knows where this is going, and it just makes his gut twist._

_“ Had to give you an AI.” The voice in his head is calm, smooth, but has a sinister echo to it._

Tucker shots out of his laying position with a hoarse cry of the word “NO” before frantically looking around. It’s dark, humid and hot as all fucking shit with random sounds all around him as he looked around. His breathing is coming in quick short breaths like an overheated dog as he looks around.

He’s out in the jungles.

He’s not on the invention.

 _They’re_ not on the invention.

 _They_ don’t have sigma.

Everything’s okay.

Maine doesn’t project as he has nothing to project on, but tucker hardly notices tell he speaks.

 ** _“I’m sorry.”_** He mumbled, his voice is also just as hoarse as tuckers was, if not ten times worse, but it might be because he’s talking in tucker’s head.

“Its okay, it’s okay. Everything’s okay now buddy.” Tucker responded as he carefully rose to his feet. “ ** _I panicked during the memory. I dragged us out here.”_** Maine mumbled as tucker looked around. “It’s okay, as long as we can get back okay?” Tucker responded and Maine grunts in confirmation and points out the direction they came in. Tucker turns and heads that way.

Not five minutes later tucker hears the clicking of a battle rifles safety being turned off and freezes into place.

“You have no idea the amount of trouble, you are in.”

Tucker turns his head slowly to see at least four of the renegade pirates and swallows thickly before one of them bashes the side of their rifle into the back of his head, and everything fades to black as he collapse.


	6. Unknown Assistance

It’d been nearly twelve hours since tucker vanished. Twelve hours and everyone was going crazy trying to find him. Tucker wasn’t in armor so they couldn’t track him down via his radio signal, and that also meant Maine had no way to communicate with him unless he left tucker and that would risk harming tucker more.

So at the moment, Washington dragged his feet practically to the meeting room. Another patrol failed in finding tucker. Carolina went from angered with tucker to concern finally when she realized this _may_ have been her fault.

Epsilon was concerned because that was his friend out there with an unstable AI that could either suddenly deconstruct itself or completely destroy tucker’s mentality and over take his body. And not only that, but because the pirates were till out and about to.

 

When wash finally reached the war room, everyone else was gathered as well, which surprised wash just a little as he took his seat. Kimball waited a few moments before she began speaking. “Alright. We all know Captain Tucker’s missing. And about 1800 hours ago, we got an anonymous tip.” She started carefully.

“What do you mean Anonymous?” Carolina and wash asked instantly.

“Meaning we didn’t get time to get the radio’s identification number nore did we get time to track the radio. But it was a video of a few pirates having a hold of Captain Tucker. They look to of been heading towards one of the bases we’ve been unable to get to due to how heavily guarded it is with plant life and such. And we all know how tough it is tracking someone in the jungles of chorus _without_ a vehicle.” She concluded.

“Okay? That’s of literal no-“‘however.” Kimball interrupted epsilon, getting an annoyed sound from the AI. “This same anonymous person, has been leaving pings and other marks, they’re obviously tailing this group. We’ve got a team gathered and –“

“Forget a team! He’s a blue! And while you all know my feelings on blues. He’s still _our_ team member in a way! Never leave a team member behind! Unless its grif!” Sarge interrupted and getting an annoyed protest from the orange soldier before he shook his head, giving up.

“Yeah. So we’ll go after him. Give us the coordinates and we’ll go after him.” Carolina responded with a nod of her head and while Kimball seemed a bit hesitant but finally gave other the coordinates, and with that, everyone else rallied up and headed out to get the needed supplies. 


	7. Mysterious Ways

A glimmer is all that was noticed before the pirates head snapped to the left with a sickening ‘ _crunch_ ’ before they dropped then grabbed and carefully dragged away so to be hidden. Once done, the glimmer showed once more before dissipating, revealing familiar sage and black armor. These pirates already knew of his betrayal, and even if they didn’t, he couldn’t risk it.

He moved a hand up and clicked on his radio for the briefest of moments, waiting tell he heard the click of confirmation before clicking his radio off. He’d been leaving various trails like this. Pings from his radio or markings against trees from his energy blade. He looked around for a moment before once again activating his cloaking. He needed to locate these pirates captive anyways.

It took a bit of effort, especially with the heavy patrols they’d set up, but he managed to get to the little make shit cell block where Lavernious was. No one was standing guard by the actual cell, but there were plenty of people outside. So the moment he stepped into the area, he could hear Lavernious making a noise because Maine was able to project.

 ** _“We have incoming. Singular person however, should be easy to take out.”_** Maine rumbled lowly.

“You do realize I have no armor and am practically a defenseless bullet pin cushion right now if I try something right?” Tucker responded.

 ** _“You have me, trained in that situation, can get you out. Got us in here, gunna get us out.”_** Maine grumbled as tucker finally stood up and turned towards the door to be ready.

When nothing was visible in front of them, tucker rose a brow, but knew better then to assume no one was there. He just didn’t expect to see them de-cloak and see _that_ coloration of armor, nor that armor in general.

“Locus?” Tucker mumbled, confused and hesitant.

“We’re leaving.” He responded, voice void of any emotion. It didn’t even sound intimidating anymore, just kind of…. Hollow.

“I don’t have any armor.” Tucker stated.

“I’ve already taken down someone of you’re size for their armor. Lets go.” He stated, activating the plasma blade and using it to cut a few of the bars carefully so to create an exit for tucker before finally deactivating it, then heading back the way he’d came.

“Should we trust him?” Tucker mumbled as he carefully stepped through the exit locus had created.

 ** _“Might have too. Only way out.”_** Maine mumbled, obviously just as hesitant.

Tucker let out a deep breath before nodding and following after locus. Hopefully this doesn’t bite him in the ass.


	8. Basiphobic

**_ The fear of falling _ **

“We have incoming!”  
“We’re taking heavy fire from the east!”

 

 _Shit they were far too early._ Locus thought as he yanked himself and tucker behind cover when a group of pirates ran past.

 ** _“I don’t like this armor.”_** Maine complained instantly.

“I know dude, but just got to hold out for a bit then we can get our armor back.” Tucker mumbled as he adjusted the grip of the battle rifle he held. When locus moved, tucker scrambled to his feet to follow after the other. Why was he even _trusting_ locus?! He tried to kill them previously!

Then again, **_so did Washington_**. This thought made tucker flinch a little before shaking his head. Washington saved them however, and helped them. And in a way, so did locus when Felix showed his true colors. Things could have gone so much worse if that’d happened.

 

They reached the edge of the base where it over hung a drop to water. Tucker could feel his heart hammering in his chest, but not because he was afraid, but because _Maine_ was afraid. Memories of sidewinder flashing threw him every time he blinked of being yanked over the edge of the cliff.

“Freeze! You two aren’t going anywhere!” Tucker turned to see several of the pirates running up and aiming at locus. They much not recognize him or something as he lifted his battle rifle a little to try and play it up, even if he could hear the blood rushing in his ears right now.

“CHARGE!”

Tucker whipped around hearing this and damn near dropped the rifle when he saw sarge at a distance and wash, Kimball and Carolina running towards them. Several of the pirates were shot down, the others flee’ing before the rest of the team showed up and surrounded them.

“Now just hold it right there! Theres no way you’re slipping past us this time locus!” Donut responded as tucker swallowed thickly stepping forward to defend locus, mind completely slipping over how he had the battle rifle raised in a defensive position like wash had drilled into him until it was too late.

 

Two shots rang out and tucker’s mouth filled with the taste of metallic earth. The battle rifle he held clattering to the floor as tucker took a few steps back. His hand going to his stomach and pulling back, the Kevlar glove glimmering from blood now as he looked up at his team, eyes wide since the one holding the smoking rifle…..

Was wash.

“Wash?” He croaked as he looked at the other, who slowly lowered the rifle he held in confusion.

“T-Tucker? Tucker?!” Wash yelped, lunging forward when tucker’s slow steps backwards stepped him over the overhang.

Tucker **_screamed_** , no, not just tucker, tucker _and_ Maine. His heart hammering in his chest faster than before, the blood escaping his wounds was slow but steady and slowly blackening his vision. Last thing he saw. Was something jumping after him.


	9. Aquaphobic

**_ The fear of Drowning _ **

**__ **

_Why did he ever think these people where fucking geniuses?!_ Locus thought as he cursed and took everyone’s confusion and surprise to shooting their own fucking comrade to reluctantly dive after the other and it seems like he wasn’t the only one with the idea because milliseconds later, Washington was jumping after tucker as well.

Locus wasn’t about to complain, it’d be more effective anyways hopefully. The moment his armor was hitting water, warnings were being fired all over his HUD, but was quick to wave it off as best he could as he went through the murky chorus water, regrouping near the bottom with Washington, who didn’t seem too happy to see him but either way. Once they both located where tucker was, they were swift to grab him and pull him towards the shore.

Obviously it was a struggle with how none of their armor was meant for this. At least they managed with mere seconds of air left. So once on shore, Washington was throwing off his own helmet coughing for breath while locus just depressurized his so to let the water spill free, focusing more on moving towards the unmoving sim trooper and getting their helmet off.

Locus didn’t have time to think before Washington was pushing him away and starting CPR on tucker, allowing locus to step back for a few moments and catch his breath for real this time before going off to do a small perimeter check and be sure everything was all right.

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He awoke with a jolt and a forceful push to the side, making him roll over while coughing up water. His thoughts raising heavily as he soon jolted up and ignoring his dizziness only to quickly regret it and cover his stomach with a hiss of pain. Thank _god_ this armor had a minor healing unit.

His right eye having an unnatural glow to it as he looked around before his gaze landed on wash who looked utterly wrecked with concern. It’s okay. He’s okay. _They’re okay_. This isn’t sidewinder. They aren’t enemies anymore. _He’s their friend again. They aren’t drowning anymore._ He also noticed that all the movements he was making, tucker made as well. **_Oh no_** _._

“Tucker? Tucker? Babe? What’s wrong? Come on talk to me?!” Wash said worriedly, making him flinch back a bit and rack his brain for an answer. He could still feel the heavy pressure and the way the nerves followed only curtain impulses. It meant tucker was still alive, meant he hadn’t taken tucker over on accident.

“ ** _He’s okay…. We’re okay. Damaged. No. not damaged. Injured, heavily. Armor went into recovery… Sort of… Let me take over for a short while, jump start everything.”_** He mumbled in explanation.

Washington stared at him for the longest of times before his shoulders dropped and he nodded. “Okay Maine. I’m glad you’re both okay.” He said gently as he carefully stood up and moved over, offering a hand to help him up, to which he took and carefully pulled himself up. “Come on, let’s go find our _hired help_ and then get back to base, okay?” Washington said gently, watching him take a glance back towards the water with the faintest looks of fear before he picked his helmet back up and secured it.

**_“Yeah. Let’s go.”_ **


	10. 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Apologies that this is so short. But at least the romance is starting... right?

It’d been three days. Three days of trudging through the forest after trying to locate locus and failing. The asshole disappeared after helping save tucker. It took a day and a half for Maine to be able to _comfortably_ release tucker from the lock down and such. But wash had kept a close eye on Maine during that time, able to tell between when Maine had control and when it was tucker.

Tucker was always relaxed, shoulders hanging, a small sway to his hips, hands playing with some unknown item in his hands while with Maine, his shoulders were always tense, hands at his sides unless clutching a weapon and an almost mechanical walk to him.

Thankfully within the third day, they got picked up by a patrol, who was very glad to see them just as glad as they were to see them. So the drive was… Eventful to say the least, of people talking about what they’d missed and such, tucker spending the drive sleeping against wash, and well, wash didn’t mind one bit, and neither did Maine with how he projected and appeared to mumble something along the words of ‘cute’.

And wash really couldn’t agree more with Maine thought. Tucker _is_ pretty cute like this.

**Author's Note:**

> If you see any misspellings or anything, drop me a comment, let me know! Or simply want to leave a comment to ask questions or just say how cool this is! Go ahead! I'd love to know what you guys think!
> 
> Add-in 1= Another thing! Want to talk with me on tumblr? Then go ahead! Always open! I'm [agentmainemeta](http://agentmainemeta.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr! some of you may already know me too! :D
> 
> Add-in 2= Also, some of you may want to know, but the italic+bold usually indicates maine/M374 talking or tucker thinking sometimes, or a referrence, hopefully its easy to tell. While Italic in general maybe a memory or just a thought in the present. I'm usually all over the please and i apologies for that.
> 
> Add-in 3= Also, lemme know what you guys think should be a good date to post constant updates instead of being spastic in my updates and not keeping ya'll waiting! This way maybe i can also surprise ya'll with multiple chapters too!


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